This piece is authored by Nicole Simon, PhD – Nassau Community College, Chair of First Year Experience Committee
The First Year Experience (FYE) Committee at Nassau Community College changed our ‘Day of Service’ into ’30 Days of Service’ to help those in need throughout our community last spring. I was able to change most of our service projects into a digital platform for our campus. This allowed more people to participate and engage during a stressful time. We will continue this model as we host our annual ‘Day of Service’ as a virtual ’30 Days of Service’ this spring as well. We have a wide range of activities that we can offer our college community. Many of these activities can also be shared out with others to promote a sense of community. Our Fashion Department helped our area tremendously by sewing hundreds of masks. These masks were donated to local hospitals and front-line workers—they were also used as a fundraiser to help support our on-campus food bank, the NEST.
We also have been hosting our annual participation in the Long Island Canstruction event through our Interior Design Department and Club. They recently built a virtual structure that was voted on by donations and were able to raise and donate $6,500 to our food bank as well. This helped us to host our annual Thanksgiving Drive to support our students for the holidays by giving out over 75 turkey and sides baskets, in addition to our weekly food support donations.
